Ok, well over the last year or so I've been all about RTS's. Gaming seems to go with one genre for a few years, for the longest time I can remember PC gaming was all about FPS's with Quake, Doom, Unreal Tournament and Call of Duty, but recentally its been all about RTS's. So here's my list of most played and most loved RTS games.
5. Starcraft
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Now this dosn't go very high on my list for a number of reasons. Back in the day when this launched, and even with the launch of Brood War I never played SC. I'd heard of it but was too busy in FPS's and any RTS game I played was one of the many C&C games from Westwood. But with the recent anoucement of SC2, and the hype arround it I deceded to download SC and Brood War from the Blizzard store and have been playing through the single player. This was where I discovered that I'm really not about the single player RTS experiance anymore. While the single player missions where pretty good, pretty hard and long with the story being told with cut scenes and ingame voice over aswell as the breifing room I really just didn't care all that much and just wanted to see what crazy shit I could build. I tried the skirmish to try and check out the tech tree of each race, and it just was impossible for a n00b SC player to get anywhere as the AI will apprentally only attack you, and rush you at the soonest possible moment, which ends up being a very frustrating experiance. I've not played it online becasue without any friends that play it, I cant imagin I will do much better.
4. Command & Conqure 2: Tiberan Sun
This is again a pretty old game, but is one of the best RTS's out there, this shows off what Westwood could really do. Not only did they build on C&C1 they added countless new units and structures and the graphial jump was huge (although granted it was relised along time after C&C1). Its maps where huge and had bigger battles that alot of current RTS's have. Its one of the best looking 2D RTS's to date.
3. Dawn of War
Ok, I'm not a fan of DoW2 but DoW is one of the most fun RTS's out there. Its mechianic of capturing nodes was pretty fun and can be very fast paced. It also had a very low camera which meant it was very easy to micro manage huge forces in intence battles. Its also one of the best games to use races from Games Workshop which when I was a lad was all I cared about (sisters of battle hell yeah!). It even had an army painter which allowed you to make your side have the most repulsive battle colours, which was really... very cool.
2. Demigod
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This game rocks. It would be number one if it had more support. Yeah I know thats a little unfair as its a brand new IP from a company with a small gaming history but thats just how it is. This took the idea of DoTA and made it AWSOME. Every game is like an entire game of Diablo, but with co-op. AWSOME! I also love the fact that the game comes DRM free, and then when I got the Retail and download version of the game I got 2 serial keys so I can give it to a friend if I wanted! And I've not even mentioned the best bit... you can play as a massive upgradable castle with legs that can absorb buildings and thats armed with a massive hammer of dsetruction, a catapult, a light tower and a shoulder full of archers!..... AWSOME!
1. Red Alert 3
At first, I didn't like RA3 at all, infact I hated it and I hated EA for killing Westwood studios. But, the more and more I played it online co-op or 'deathmatches' the more I loved it. You really have to let it grown on you before you'll get it, and even more so if you liked RA2 (which I did, alot). EA and whats left of Westwood really have taken Red Alert where it needed to go, and instead of it being a C&C3 clone with diffrent units its a totally diffrent game thats heavily focused on the micro and small scale battles. But, if your handly with your reasouse managment you can still achive massive armies. Not only this but EA actually seem to give a shit about support, which from what I can tell, is a 1st! Who knows what the future brings for RA3, all I know is they keep making it more and more ballanced and keep on updating the C&C site, which is all good as far as I'm consered.
actual RTS
1. Supreme Commander Forged Alliance
3. Empire Total War
4. Red Alert 3
5. Battleforge
lgendary RTS
1. Star Craft
2. Total Annihilation
3. WarCraft3 TFT
4. C&C Tiberium Conflict
5. C&C Generals
oh, I see what you mean
I like the sequels of these because they are the ones I have, if anyone wants an online game in either of them im up for it
Ground Control is actually a free game now.
http://www.fileplanet.com/156136/150000/fileinfo/Ground-Control-(Free-Game)
If you're feeling nostalgic. It won't look too pretty now, but it had a great story
For me:
1. Starcraft (Best and most strategic RTS ever made).
2. Supreme Commander Forged Alliance (Wouldn't have died if GPG decided to support it).
3. Demigod (Great game, I have a ton of fun playing it).
4. Sins of a Solar Empire: Entrenchment (The only problem with this franchise is that games take WAY TOO LONG).
5. Company of Heroes (Revolutionary for it's time).
1. Company of Heroes
3. Sins of a Solar Empire
4. Warcraft III
5. Supreme Commander
1. Dawn Of War (with expansions)
3. Supreme Commander Forged Alliance
4. StarCraft
5. maybe Rise of Legends
1. Age of Empires 2: Conquerors
2. Rise of Nations
3. Stronghold: Crusader
4. Sins of a Solar Empire: Entrenchment
5. Age of Mythology: Titans
1. Rise of Nations/Thrones & Patriots
I love this game I still play it often, this is what the age of empires games should have been, great depth, excellent meld of turn based meta on the map and real time. So many features like the unit time with change the different bonuses per country, cards with bonuses, etc...a great game.
2. Star Trek Armada II
ONe of the few times I like the sequel more than the original, in particular the simplification of the crew/officer reasource, there was just a bit too much complexity in the economy of the first one for my personal tatstes. One of the only 3D rts out there, an excellent map creation / mod tool allowing for even full mission/senario creation, some of the best unit AI I have ever had the joy of playing with/against, and a good mix of varied races.
3. Dawn of War up to Dark Crusade
Brutality, brought gratuitous violence from fps to rts as well as introduced many new features to the rts market, varible cover, moral ( a favorite mechanic), and a fast paced almost twitch style of forced expanison with its innovative reasource system. Unfortunatly the cameras low ceiling can be frustrating, THQ's support for it (patches, extra content) sux/ non existent, and its sequel took a great start and dumbed it down while slappoing prety graphics on it.
4. Star Wars Empire at War & Forces of Coruption
A veyr fun game to play if a bit exausting with the amount of well managmet involoved; the main thing that drags this lower on the list is the ground portion of the game, maps are very repetive, units not as dynamic as for the space battles.
5. Sins of A solar Empire
Innovative, massive scale
however it does have some major cons that drag ti down for me and I hope to see improved in the future as I beleivce the engine has a lot of potential: Very long game times for the most part, can be a drag would like to see jsut a straight up fleet combat option added like in EOW where you can skip empire building and just smash some heads if in a less patient mood, NO CAMPAGIN AND SHALLOW STORY LINE, a real bummer for me becuase I like immersion in my games, low production value on intro and avatars, fell kinda tacked on and out of place in a game with 3d models to have 2d avatars slaped on, and last but by no means least, the lack of a true 3d implementation for combat and building. A good start, and a good company, but the game fell short for me.
Honorable mentions
Supreme Commander
a good prrof of concept of seemless zoom and various managment tools, but its bugs on relese, lack of difference between factions (there basically all te same with diff paint jobs), and run of the mill storyline ruin what could have been a great succesor to total anhilation.
Starcraft
Good Campaign, fairly good balance, seriously overhyped though
Command and Counquer (entire franchise)
I really enjoy its slick interface and its a good pary game but wish some more depth and strategy would be mixed in
1. Homeworld (Series) A personal favorite for many reason, some gameplay flaws, but an extremly immersive experience.
2. Kohan (Immortal Sovereigns and Ahrimans Gift, Kohan 2 was ruined by fixed settlements) Kohan introduced distance and supply as meaningful concepts in an RTS, unit balance was excellent between the four factions. Really sad alot of people never got to jump online and play a few team games of Kohan.
3. SOASE
4. Take Command (Series) - I must be some kind of civil war nut huh? This game has the potential to be one of the best RTT games ever, lack of multiplayer is a definite drawback. A realtime (second for second) engine that emphasizes roads, distance, supply, terrain, leadership, and unit formation. It becomes an amazing battlefield experience; you really feel like a general.
Watch for Gettysburg from http://www.norbsoftware.com its one of the 2 guys who made the take command games doing it now with full 3D (instead of sprites) and multiplayer.
5. Rise of Nations - a mainstream RTS that introduced some really cool concepts with borders and attrition.
In no particualar order, some of my favorites:
needs moar STRONGHOLD CRUSADER!
althoughghgghghgh, i do also like...
- demigod
- starwars empire at war
- age of empires 2
- c&c 3
all in no particular order
1. Act of War
2. Dawn of War
3. Homeworld 2
4. Sins of a Solar Empire
5. Company of Heroes
This is an interesting discussion.. thank you for sharing.
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My take on HW2:
+ Modules, Subsystems
+ Visuals, Audio
+ UI
+ Automated end-mission resource gathering
+ Hiig Destroyer
- Free reinforcement for strikecraft squadrons
- "Strike groups" instead of formations
- Meh story as compared to HW1, as unfair a standard as that is.
- Torpedo Frigate
Overall though, a very good game!
I still remember the first mission where the Taiidan destroyer first shows up.. capturing it was a huge pain, but so worth it
Good news I got my Homeworld Cataclysm to work... cleaned up the disk and I am running it in windows 2000 mode... Im having no problems and I had to screw around with the graphics settings too... On the 2nd to last mission and having a blast!
Star trek Armadas... now those were some fun games...
1. Medieval II: Total War. Annoyances aside, this is awesome RTS. I personally don't like to have to constantly deal with units streaming from factories. You have what you have, and you have to be a tactician instead of a spammer.
2. Sins of a Solar Empire. Yes, this is more of a spam game, but it is still amazing and very well done.
3. Star Wars: Empire at War. The land battles sucked, but the space battles were awesome and a lot of fun. All the Star Wars action without the annoying breaks for talking.
4. Command and Conquer 3 and the Battle for Middle Earth games. I put these into one number because they are basically the same game in different shells. You can tell by the gameplay and skirmish set-ups. I haven't played C&C 3 in ages because the big jump in difficulty between AI levels is really annoying.
5. Can't think of a fifth RTS, though I should try one. I might get Company of Heroes or something like that. I am also "trying" Homeworld 2.
The Total War series doesn't really qualify as real-time strategy games. Given the majority of TW gamers play in campaign mode, it would be more accurate to classify them as turn-based.
That is true, but the RTS elements are great, even though the AI is lame.
My favourites (based on how long I played them and how much I liked them):
1. Warcraft 3
2. C&C: Yuri's Revenge
3. C&C: Zero Hour
4. Dawn of War/Dark Crusade
5. Rome: Total war
Honourable mentions: Sins of a Solar Empire (wish it could've had a single player campaign) and Tiberian Sun (great fun, even if a bit dated)
1 - Total Annihilation - It broke onto the RTS scene as the zenith of perfection, and is still pretty much at the very top of the pile. It introduced so many new things that completely shaped modern RTS games...and they all worked!
2 - Supreme Commander - Ok mister Taylor, you are the RTS god. Any game that doesn't have strategic zoom just doesn't feel good enough to me now. Thousands of units for the closest true strategy game around.
3 - Dune 2 - Not the first, but definately the most memorable of all early RTS's laying the foundation for what was to come (eep, Sandworm, harversters to the rocks!!!).
4 - Sins - great graphics, large scale (with a strategic zoom!), all the best elements of 4x games such as research and tech trees etc but at a slower pace so you could actually think and strategize rather than spam clicking.
5 - Dawn of War - Took RTS games into the POC era. If only for the sync-kills this game deserves a place.
Honourable mention for the RTS cousins the RTT games. Mech Commander and World in Conflict especially. And Dark Reign... a forgotten RTS gem.
And death to Starcraft. It was imbalanced on release, offered nothing new to the genre and took years to get working well...by which time it was out of date. Fun sure, but popularity doesn't equate to all time greatness.
ah, its good to see some people still have some sense with RTS games
here's mine-
1. Sins
2. Dune 2000 (it's old and the campaign is short for all 3 factions, but it's great fun)
3. DoW/- DK (demo, as I've only played that and the Space Marines/Tau are awesome)
4. I have to say that I enjoyed the CnC3 demo, so I think that it would certainly be a good skirmish game.
5. probably additional CnC titles, as I haven't played much RTS, mostly just FPS like the Battlefield series (Vietnam was the best if you ask me), and CoD4 (which I thought was scanty for the SP), and a couple of others, like the OLD Quake 2 (DIE STROGG!! LOL), and then I've played a couple of arcadish-style space flight sims that were fun.
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